The Gifted
by Silver-Eyed-Rukia
Summary: In a fight against a dangerous king with a unknown gift their journey leads them through ice and snow, over mountains and fields and creates a strong bond between two souls not even the strongest curse is able to break. -DISCONTINUED (UNKNOWN PERIOD OF TIME)-


**The Gifted**

by

_Silver-Eyed Rukia_

**Rated**: T for mild violence. May change in later chapters._  
_

**Summary**: When Natsuki meets the mysterious princess from Lienid she immediately knows, that she is a Gifted too; but she isn't sure what kind of gift she has. But the crimson eyed princess is the only one who isn't afraid of her and constantly fights for Natsuki's trust. In a fight against a dangerous king with a unknown gift their journey leads them through ice and snow, over mountains and fields and creates a strong bond between two souls not even the strongest curse is able to break; turning them into a passionate, independent, intimate, bickering, loving couple.

**Story**: AU. Takes place in earlier times. (Sorry for any mistakes concerning their way of speech; I'm not familiar with the old English language.)

**Note**: Will be updated if I find the time to continue this story.

**Disclaimer**: I do not own Mai-HiME or Mai-Otome characters used in this story. All rights go to sunrise.

**Special thanks to**:_ Azfixiation_ for beta-ing my story. You're great!

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_The eyes are the mirror of the soul_

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In this oubliette ruled total darkness, but the woman with the similar black hair had a vague plan of the layouts in her head. Up to now everything was just like shown on Nao's plans and maps, just like how she was used to it from the redhead. Natsuki let her hands trail over walls and doors and counted them as she past them, counting in the many hallways, too. She rounded the next corner, when it was the time to do so and stopped finally in front of an opening in one of the walls which should lead to the stairs leading deeper into the darkness. Kneeling down, she scanned the first stone-step and felt that it was covered with wet and slick moss.

`_That's Nao's staircase then, huh?_´ She just hoped the redhead and Takeda, who were following her with their torches, would see the moss and be careful with climbing down the slippery stone-path. If they fell down they would wake the dead from their slumber for sure. Natsuki walked down the staircase; one junction to the left and two to the right. She could already hear voices as she reached a hallway where a torch lit the opposite wall with its orange-colored light. Across from it was another path; and according to Nao's report there would be something about two to ten guards standing in front of a certain cell at the end of the corridor.

These guards were her mission. Because of them she had been send up ahead.  
Natsuki snuck up towards the light and laughter; she could have stopped and listened to their voices to find out how many people she was actually going to fight, but she hadn't got the time. After pulling her hood deeper into her face she rounded the corner.

She nearly fell over her first victims who were sitting on the ground, facing each other. The scent of high-proofed alcohol lingered in the air. Natsuki kicked and punched them on their temples and necks and they slumped to the floor before they knew what had hit them. Now there was only one guard left, who sat in front of the cell at the end of the hallway. He stood up hastily and pulled out his sword. While she walked up to him she was sure that he couldn't see her eyes due to the light coming from the flame behind her. She analyzed his size, his movements, the strength of the arm holding the sword that was pointed at her.

"Stay put! I know who you are." He was brave, this man; his voice was calm and even. He let his sword knife through the air threateningly. "You don't scare me." He attacked. She ducked under his blade of a sword and swung her legs like a windmill. One foot connected with his temple and the man fell to the floor.

The raven head stepped over his body, walked towards the cell and peeked into the darkness that swallowed it. A shape cowered at the far end of the wall, a human who was too tired or too perished to pay attention to the fight in the hallway. She had her arms around her knees and her head between her legs. She shivered; Natsuki could hear her breathing. The raven head moved and light fell upon the woman's hunched form. She had long, wavy blond hair and something golden glittered at her ear. Nao's maps served their purpose, this woman was a Lienid. The person they were searching for.

Emeralds narrowed as the owner pulled at the deadbolt. Locked. Well, that wasn't a surprise and not her problem. She whistled once, quietly, like an owl. She then turned around the body of the man and put a pill into his mouth. She repeated the action with all the other guards. Just as she was about to ask if her two companions got lost in the hallways they came around the corner and walked past her.

"A quarter of an hour, not longer," she said.

"A quarter." The redhead's voice sounded like a growl. "Be careful." The lights of their torches flooded the walls as they made their ways towards the cell. The Lienid groaned and coiled her arms tighter around her frame. Natsuki saw that her clothes were torn and dirty. The pick-locks at Takeda's ring tinkled and the raven head would have liked to stay and watch how the door opened but she was needed elsewhere. She grabbed the packet full of pills and walked away.

The guards had to report to the dungeon-guard and the dungeon-guard to the sub-guard. The sub-guard had to inform the castle-guard. The night-guard the royal-guard, the wall-guard and the garden-guard had to report to the castle-guard, too. As soon as the absence of even one of the guards was noticed they would give the alarm, and Natsuki and her companions wouldn't be far away enough by then; they would be doomed. They would get chased, it would come to a bloodbath and somebody would see Natsuki's eyes and recognize her. To prevent that from happening she had to silence every single guard. Nao had assumed there would be somewhat about twenty of them. Princess Nina had given her thirty pills, just in case.

Most of the guards weren't a problem for her; if she could sneak up on them or if they were in small groups they wouldn't even know what came over them. The castle-guard was harder to overwhelm, because five guards were standing in front of the door of the captain, guarding it. Natsuki whirled through them, kicked and punched and the captain jumped out of his seat and ran out of the room, throwing himself into the turmoil.

"I recognize a Gifted when I see him!" He stabbed out and she threw herself to the side. "Let me see your eyes, boy, and I'll cut them out for sure!" Natsuki hit him over the head with the backside of her knife with a certain amount of pleasure, grabbed him by his hair and put a pill into his mouth. When they would wake up with the feeling of shame and a headache they would think a Gifted had overrun them. A boy with the gift to fight. They would say he was alone and nobody would assume that the attacker had been a girl, in her plain pants and hooded shirt. And nobody had seen Nao or Takeda either; Natsuki had made sure of that.

They wouldn't expect the intruder was her. Whoever the Gifted Lady Natsuki was, she was no criminal who stalked through courts at midnight. Besides, she was still on her way in the east. Her uncle, King of the Middluns, had seen her off this morning and the whole city had watched that Captain Nao Zhang and adjutant general Takeda Masashi accompanied her. Only a fast days ride into the opposite direction could have brought them to King Yuuichi's yard.

Natsuki ran through the palace courtyard, passing patches, fountains and statues of King Yuuichi. For such a cowardly king the garden looked rather beautiful, it smelled like grass and earth and the sweet scent of blooming flowers added a nice effect to the placid atmosphere. As she crossed the garden she left a tack of unconscious guards. Unconscious, not dead; a great difference. The redhead as well as Takeda, along with the majority of the council had wanted her to kill. But when they had planned the mission, Natsuki reminded them that it wouldn't give them any more time.

"And when they wake up?", the adjutant general had said, eyeing the small package full of pills warily. Princess Nina had felt offended.

"You don't have faith in my medicines! They will not wake up early."

Dark green eyes had shifted to rest on the now standing princess. "Killing is faster." As he had said that, his eyes had shifted again and had been starring into the Emeralds of Natsuki. The in the shadows hidden heads had nodded.

"I will make it in the given time", she had said, and when Takeda had wanted to object, she had raised a hand to silence him. "Enough. I will not kill them. When you want them dead you have to send some else."

Nao had grinned and had patted the adjutant's back. "Think about it, it's going to be way more fun, Masashi. The perfect robbery past all the guards of Yuuichi, and no even dead? The perfect game!"

Laughter had erupted from within the room, but Natsuki hadn't even smiled. She wouldn't kill if it wasn't necessary. You couldn't change back a death, and she had killed enough. Mostly for her uncle. She was conducive to King Wang; he found it cheaper to send an envoy instead of a whole army, if trouble occurred at the frontiers. But she had killed for the council too, when it had been unavoidable. This time, it was avoidable.

At the end of the fruit garden she found an old guard. He supported the weight of his body on his sword; his back was round and hunched. Natsuki snuck up behind him and stopped. The hands on the hilt of his sword were shaking. The raven head hadn't had a high esteem for some king that didn't send his subordinates into retirement properly. But if she didn't knock him out he would give alarm. With a well aimed blow to the head he slumped to the ground with a groan. Natsuki caught him and lowered his body to the ground as softly as she could muster; she then put a pill into his mouth. When she was about to turn around she noticed a bump on the man's head. She just hoped he had a thick skull.

She had killed without the intent to do so once, a memory she brought to her mind over and over again. At that time, ten years ago, she had found out what her gift was. She had been an 8 year old child. A man, a distant relative had visited the court. Natsuki hadn't liked him; his strong perfume, the way he looked at the attendants with a lecherous look, how he touched them when he thought nobody would notice him. When he began to pay more attention to her, she got warily.

"Such a beautiful little one", she said. "The eyes of Gifted can be so ugly at times, but yours add to your prettiness. You're a lucky girl. What is your gift, cutie? Storyteller? Mentalist? I know it; you're a dancer."

Natsuki hadn't known what her gift was back then. Some people needed longer than others until they knew what gift they had. But even if she had known what it was, she hadn't been content to tell her cousin about it. She scowled at him and averted his gaze, but as his arms reached out for her leg she spun around and punched him in the face. So hard that the nasal bone was jammed into his brain.  
Ladies had screamed, one had fainted. When they had lifted him out of the pool of his own blood and noticed that he was dead, the room went silent. Everyone had starred at her, taking a few steps backwards. It was good to eat meals from the gifted cook, or take one of the horses to the gifted veterinarian, but a girl that could kill? That was to handle with care.

Any other king would have killed her, even if she was the daughter of his sister. But Wang was smart. He saw, that one day his niece would come in handy, and so he sent her into her room with week-long house arrest. Nobody had liked her from the very start, but from that point they avoided her like she was death itself. "Be wary of the girl with the silver ring around her eyes", guests whispered, "she killed her own cousin with one blow. Because he had complimented her eyes."  
Even King Wang avoided her. A murderous dog may be of use for a king, but he didn't want it to sleep at his feet.

Princess Nina was the only one who searched for Natsuki's company. "You won't do it again, right? I don't believe that my father would allow you to kill anybody you don't like."

"I didn't want to kill him", she said.

"What happened?"

The raven head thought back to the moment. "I felt that I was in danger. Because of that, I punched him."

Nina shook her head and soft orange orbs rested on her own with silver trapped ones. "One has to master a gift", she pointed out. "Especially the gift to kill. You have to, or else my father won't allow me to see you anymore."

It was a fearsome thought. "I don't know how to do it."

The princess pondered over that statement. "You could ask Nao. The spies of the king know how to hurt without killing somebody. That's how they get information."

Nina was eleven, three years older than Natsuki and despite her age rather wise. She followed her advice and went to Nao, Wang's Captain and master of spies. The redhead wasn't stupid, he knew that she should fear the girl with the silver encircled eyes, But she had somewhat of a fantasy; what if Natsuki was as shocked as all the others about the death of her cousin. The more she thought about it the more she liked the sound of it.

She started the training with laying down rules. Natsuki shouldn't test her strength on humans, only on dolls. She should practice with prisoners, men who were already sentenced to death.

She practiced every day. She learned how to calculate her speed and her explosive blows. She learned everything about angles, placing and intensity of a deadly hit, that would turn her enemy into a cripple. She learned how to disarm a man, how to break his leg and twist his arm so long until he couldn't move without pain anymore. She learned how to fight with a sword, with knifes and daggers. She was fast and purposeful and so very creative, that she could overwhelm a man with both her arms tied to her sides. That was her gift.

After a while her control got better and she trained with some of Wang's soldiers; eight to ten full armed men, covered from head to toe with armor. It was quite the sight: Adults grunted and shuffled around, trying to catch a child who dived under only to come up again seconds later, knocking them out with them just realizing it when they lay to her feet.

Often people from the castle came to see the spectacle, but when Natsuki caught them staring, they looked away and ran off. King Wang didn't seem to care that Nao spent her time training with the raven head. He thought it important. Natsuki wasn't of use to him if she couldn't control her gift.

And now, here in King Yuuichi's courtyard, nobody could blame her for lack of self-control. Fast, soundless she moved through the grass next to the stony path. Nao and Takeda should have reached the garden wall by now, where two servants of Yuuichi, friends of the council, should guard their horses. She was nearly there herself, saw the dark wall; black in front of a black sky.

Her mind wandered, but she wasn't daydreaming. Her senses were sharpened. She noticed every leaf that fell, every branch that snapped. And because of that she was surprised when a woman came out of the dark and grabbed her from behind. The stranger sneaked her arms around Natsuki's chest and put a knife to the raven head's throat. Before the woman could even utter a single word though, Natsuki had numbed her arm, slapped away the knife and had thrown her over her shoulder.

She landed on her feet.

Her mind was working flat out. It was a gifted person, a fighter. So much was clear. And if the hand that had touched on of her breasts wasn't numb, and she was sure of that, the woman had noticed that she was a woman, too.

She turned around and they eyed each other suspiciously. Both were cloaked in shadows, nearly invisible for one another. She spoke first.

"I have heard from a lady with this special gift." Her voice was accented and smooth with a tinge of seriousness. But Natsuki didn't know this accent. She had to find out who this woman was so that she knew what to do with her.

"I can not imagine what kind of business she might have, that would lead her so far away from her home and into the yard of King Yuuichi. And that at midnight", she said, her voice calm and even, yet it held an unspoken question. With a nearly invisible motion she placed herself between the wall and the raven head. She was taller than her and graceful like a lion. Deceiving calm, ready for the jump. A torch at the nearby wall let the golden rings in her ears glitter. Her face was spotless.

The woman changed her position slightly, her body being as tensed up as the raven head's own. She didn't have much time, she had to decide. The stranger knew who she was, but if she was a Lienid, she didn't want to kill her.

"Don't you have anything to say, lady? You don't think that I will let you pass without an explanation, yes?" Her tone was playful. Emeralds observed her calmly and the owner noticed, that the woman was stretching her fingers and the golden rings on her hand. That was enough proof. This woman was a Lienid.

"You are a Lienid", she said.

"You have good eyes."

"Not good enough to see the color of your eyes."

She laughed, a light and nice sound that was in heavy contrast with the atmosphere. "In exchange, I think I know how yours are tinged."

Rationality told her to kill the woman. "You are one to talk about being far away from home," the raven head reasoned, trying to distract the unknown woman. "What is a Lienid doing in the courtyard of King Yuuichi?"

"I will tell you my reasons, if you tell me yours."

"I won't tell you anything and you have to let me pass."

A slender brow rose. "I have to?"

"If not I will have to force you."

"Do you think you're able to?"

Slowly but steadily this woman was making her mad. The raven head feinted right and she avoided the hit effortlessly. She repeated if faster and again the woman avoided the hit. She was good. But she was Natsuki.

"I know I can do it." Her voice left no room for arguments.

"So?" She sounded amused. "But it will take hours."

Why was she playing with her? Did she amuse herself with strangers in other people's courts? Maybe she was a criminal, a gifted criminal. Any other would have given alarm minutes ago. And according to a popular saying: the enemy of my enemy is my friend. But was that really the case?

The council would tell her to kill the woman, would tell her she was putting everyone in danger if she let this stranger live. This stranger who knew her identity. But this woman was not like any other criminal she had met before. She didn't seem dumb nor cruel, or dangerous.

She couldn't kill a Lienid when she was saving another.

Maybe she was crazy, and she was sure she was going to hate herself for it, but she wouldn't do it. "I trust you", the woman said suddenly. She moved out of the way and waved for Natsuki to come over. Said girl found her strange and impulsive, but she took notice that the Lienid wasn't on guard anymore, and she was never one to let a chance slip. Immediately she threw her foot at her head and hit the woman's forehead. Her eyes widened, before she fell to the ground.

"Maybe it was uncalled for", Natsuki murmured, placing the fallen woman on the ground carefully, "but I don't know what to do with you. I risked enough with letting you alive." Another pill vanished in the depths of the womans throat. She then turned her head towards the only source of light; the lone torch on the wall.

She was younger than the raven head had thought, not much older than she herself, nineteen or twenty at most. A line of blood trickled down her forehead and Natsuki gently wiped it away, not wanting to get dirt into the wound. The first two buttons of her chemise were unbuttoned and the light was playing with the shadows of her well shaped bosoms.

What a strange woman. Maybe Nina knew who she was. She shuddered and stood up, throwing a last, indefinable glance onto the fallen figure, then she started to run.  
The others were waiting.

They were riding fast. The blond Lienid was bound onto a horse, she was too weak to stand or ride on her own. They had put many warm blankets around her shaking frame when they stopped once. Natsuki was getting impatient.

"Doesn't she know that it is the middle of summer?"

"She is chilled to the bones, My Lady", Nao replied, more or less snappy. "She shivers and she's sick. If she dies during our ride then rescuing her was meaningless.

`_Maybe I should have killed her_´, thought the raven head as they rushed through the dark woods. `Maybe _I should have killed her. She knew who I am_.´  
But she hadn't been dangerous nor had she been suspicious. And she had been curious; she had trusted her, this stranger.

On the other hand, she most likely didn't know about the trail of unconscious guards, and she wasn't going to trust her anymore if she woke from her slumber.  
If she told King Yuuichi about this, and the king would tell it to King Wang, the raven head would get a lot of trouble. Sergey didn't know about the Lienid, or Natsuki's part-time job as a savior and she liked it that way.

Emeralds closed for a moment, before snapping open again. She didn't have time to think about things like that. She had to bring the blond woman into a warm place and, the most important, to Nina. Pushing herself deeper into her saddle, she sped towards the North, but a voice in the back of her head kept her mind distracted. `_Why didn't you ask for her name? Why didn't you take a look at her eyes as you had the chance?_´ She honestly didn't know. But at the time, it had felt right. It had felt...as if it hadn't been the last time for the two of them to cross paths.

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**Afterword**

Maybe a few people have the feeling that certain scenes seem to be familiar. This story is based on the book "Graceling" by Kristin Cashore. My apologies if it's too close to the original plot; it is needed for the first few chapters, to bring the story and characters into the right position. I hope you enjoy it nonetheless.

Now to another topic.

I have noticed that the amount of reviews is slowly but steadily decreasing and it's a shame for all the writers, and as a result the readers, when said writers may stop publishing their stories because they think nobody likes them (the stories). Honestly, I want you to think about it; when you've worked very hard on something you want to be praised, want to enjoy the done job, am I right? Never take one's work for granted, and if you like a story then review it and don't just put it onto your favorite stories list. You don't have to write a whole critique or a review about 6000 characters or something, just say what you liked/disliked or something like that. Encourage your favorite authors by replying to their stories. Go and spread my word, because the Mai-HiME fandom is either loosing members or the members are loosing interest. Something has to be done about that, and it hurts to see so good stories like Gargoyle Hime getting so less reviews. And please don't judge a person's story by it's first few sentences; everybody of us started small. Give it a shot, and you can decide whether you like it or not after the first chapter.

I'm sorry for taking your time, but that was something I needed to say, and I hope you understand what I want to point out. And when someone believes I'm begging for reviews he or she shall think that; I am not, but I do still enjoy the pleasure of reading nicely written reviews, so it'd be nice if you left some for me to read^^

**PS**: To all my faithful Wolf Girl readers: I'm so sorry I haven't updated in ages, but life is keeping me distracted and busy, and I have to say that I'm somehow in a writer's block concerning that story. I'm thinking about if I should re-write it, and maybe I'll do that, but it'll take some time. So please don't scratch it forever, it's just put on ice for a while.

**Phrase of the day**

_The kids of tomorrow don't need today when they live in the sins of yesterday_

"Red Flag" by Billy Talent

**If you liked it, please** **REVIEW**.

No flaming please.


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